


Interrupted

by darkandstormyslash



Category: Taboo (TV 2017)
Genre: Interrupted Sex, M/M, Prostitution, people being used, people being used even though they know they're being used
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-06
Updated: 2017-02-06
Packaged: 2018-09-22 11:29:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9605855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkandstormyslash/pseuds/darkandstormyslash
Summary: Set somewhere at the beginning of episode 5. James Delaney comes to see Godfrey, but Godfrey's busy with a client.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is just my usual, I'm afraid. Short, third person, present tense, character and plot analysis thinly disguised as a story.

The simpering thing at the door tells him that Godfrey is busy, but it doesn't take much more than a small glower before Delaney is pointed in the direction of the appropriate room. People move as he passes by, eyes sliding over him, some showing flickering interest. He ignores them all but he does allow himself to relax slightly. Here, he feels safe. Maybe it's despite the level of fake pretense that surrounds the place, or maybe because of it, but the whole building feels more honest, more real. The painted faces and faded dresses seem less  _wrong_ somehow than the polished halls of the East India Company, or the dripping dyes of Dumbarton's surgery. Here there are no hidden knives in fancy phrases, just people; the ugly and the true.

He keeps himself outside the door for two impatient minutes, listening to the creaking scrape of the bed behind it, before he kicks through the lock. It's not a very well-made lock and it sits in an even worse-made door. The wood splinters sideways, the door groans open, and James Delaney shoulders his way inside, kicking it shut behind him.

He sees Godfrey's eyes widen, his hands gripping tight at the bed, his skirts rumpled up to somewhere around his middle. There's a man on top of him spluttering and complaining but James ignores him, tugging out his pipe and knocking it against the side of the cabinet. "Need a word, God'." He thinks he sees a look of genuine irritation pass over Godfrey's face, and that alone makes him watch, interested and intense. The man's voice gets higher and louder, Godfrey's hands flutter and placate, and the words get nastier and stronger and  _whore_ and  _bitch_ and  _not paying for some grubby slut who'll not give satisfaction_ -"

And then it goes on for too long, and James's patience for this sort of thing died somewhere long ago in Africa. He steps forward, grabs the man by the scruff of the neck and hauls him out the door. The man is  _still_ spluttering and James can't believe that Godfrey's arse is really worth this much of a fuss. He yanks the man close and growls low, "What are you going to do, fetch your lawyer? Come here again and I'll fuck you myself."

That shuts him up. James flings him down the corridor then shuts the door, flicking a finger at the broken lock and rather wishing he hadn't destroyed it. He grabs a chair instead, daft little spindly thing, and wedges it against the handle which is still mostly in place.

Godfrey's rearranged his skirts and is sitting on the bed, looking pale. Delaney drops down next to him and picks up his pipe again. He waits to see if Godfrey needs to say anything; if any apologies or thanks or even angry insults are forthcoming, but there's silence so he moves right on. "What are they doing about the burglary?"

There's still silence. Godfrey is shaking a little. James sighs, glancing around the room for some sort of clue as to the best way to get down to business as soon as possible. After a moments thought he tugs out a handkerchief and hands it over. It sits untouched on Godfrey's lap until the young man eventually manages, "I don't  _always_ cry."

Well. Conversation at least, that's something.

"Did he..." James stops. Hums. Can't think of the right way to put it and finishes with an out-of-place, "Treat you right?"

Godfrey gives a bitter sounding snort and picks up the handkerchief, shifting along as James lies down on the bed. "I'm not sure why that's your concern."

"'Course it's my concern." James closes his eyes. It's far easier to read Godfrey's mood with his eyes closed. He can hear the shifts of his body, the tightness in his breath, the tears he tries to hold for when James isn't looking. "If he leaves a bruise you can't work."

"Oh God." It's whispered low and desperate. Maybe Godfrey thinks he can't hear it.

"What are they saying about the burglary?" 

There's silence and then a small creak of the springs as Godfrey stands up from the bed. James stays lying down, as still as death, and listens as Godfrey takes a few steps across the floor. There's the small scrape of a chair as he sits down at the vanity cabinet and then few clinks and noises that speak of pots and bottles opening. Probably makeup. It isn't something James has heard much before.

"They should've said at the front that I was busy." 

The voice is tight, unhappy, put-upon. Godfrey has no problem being interrupted, nor does he have any particular desire to be serviced by the man James has just thrown out the door. What Godfrey objects to, James realizes, is being saved, and the reason he objects to being saved by James Delaney is because he likes it far, far too much.

"I don't care if you're busy." The little clinks stop, the chair scrapes, and for a moment James wonders whether Godfrey would actually fling a pot of rouge at him. He thinks it would probably be better for Godfrey if he did. But of course he doesn't, just sits silently, breath fast and shallow. "I don't have much time."

"James..." he raises a hand in the air and the plea fades out unspoken. James knows how to play people, in certain and specific ways, but it does always come as a slight shock when he seems to make them care for him as well. Michael Godfrey, Lorna Bow, the both of them have nothing to gain from his death but freedom and release and yet they both seem desperately eager that he should remain alive. He thinks of Cholmondeley and his chemicals; people always seem to crave the things that harm them.

And is he, James Delaney, any different?

"The saltpeter." He repeats, his fingers motion Godfrey closer while the rest of him remains motionless on the bed. "It was stolen. What are they doing about it."

The chair scrapes, and Godfrey walks back. The springs creak as he sits on the bed and takes James's hand. There's a moment of pause, a breath on the line between sin and redemption, and then Godfrey talks and tells him everything.


End file.
